Think there’s something wrong with selling domain name parking accounts? At face value, it seems innocent enough. Ask yourself why people are buying these domain name parking accounts. Did they not qualify for a domain name parking account at that domain name parking company? If so, what right do you have to sell them your domain parking account so they can get in? In case you didn’t know, the most common reason people attempt to buy domain name parking accounts is so they can commit click fraud. Click fraud hurts everyone from domain name investors who will end up getting paid less per click, to advertisers who are getting zero return on their investment, and finally domain name parking companies which have to waste resources on combating a problem which has been magnified by the actions of some domain name investors. Don’t sell your domain name parking accounts.

Selling domain name parking accounts is against the Terms of Service of every domain name parking company. By doing this, you’re not only abusing the trust and breaking the rules of the domain name parking company (and their upstream provider), you’re also hurting all domainers in the process.

Most of the people who buy domain parking accounts are doing it to commit click fraud. Quite predictably, those engaging in click fraud will burn through a lot of domain name parking accounts fast — hence the reason some attempt to buy existing domain name parking accounts so they may continue to commit click fraud. Others will open new accounts using stolen or created identities, or simply switch to a different domain parking company and start committing click fraud once again.

Click fraud will never convert for advertisers. Most advertisers are paying for clicks expecting that a certain percentage of the clicks will convert into either a sale or a certain action being taken (eg. applying for a credit card). If an advertiser is unable to convert a sufficient number of clicks into the sales or actions, they’ll be left with no choice but to either lower their bids or cease purchasing paid clicks altogether (eg. moving to a Cost Per Action or other online or offline advertising platform).

While some domainers may have less devious reasons for wanting a domain name parking account, such as not having enough domains or enough quality domains to qualify for one with a particular domain parking company), it’s still against the parking company’s terms of service and you’re abusing the trust they placed in you by doing this.

Parking companies need to maintain high quality traffic. Selective parking companies are able to give their members “on average” more parking revenue because they’re selective about the domains and domainers they allow to park domains on their parking platforms. Lowering overall traffic quality by selling your domain parking account to someone whose domains didn’t meet the minimum quality requirements or chooses to engage in click fraud hurts everyone – domainers, advertisers, the domain parking company, their upstream provider, and YOU, because the domain parking account he bought off you was created in your name. 

The LLLL.com buyout occurred one year ago to this day. The LLLL.com buyout has held, however short domain names as a whole have greatly decreased in value, as has much of the domain name world. The LLLL.com buyout has had a roller coaster of a ride since last year, as has most of the short domain name market, with prices for most short domains peaking in February 2008 and falling significantly in the months afterwards. We’ve seen some enormous short domain name sales this year, such as Fund.com for nearly $10MM and many NNN.coms selling for $100k+ each. While domain name investor to domain name investor prices have fallen, end user prices continue to remain strong in the short domain name market segment. One short domain name market which has weather the economic storm rather well has been the NNNN.com market. With increasing global internet penetration, we can expect short domains to be increasingly desirable in the future once the current economic woes subside. While this blog is new, my blogging about short domain names isn’t — I’ve been blogging since November 2007 about short domains, previously over at 4LetterNoob.wordpress.com. Like my previous short domain blog, this blog will be dedicated to domain names of 5 or less characters. To view more information on short domains including information on how we came to having an LLLL.com buyout, please click on the title of this post to read the rest of the content about short domains. All posts on this blog will have an excerpt (such as this), as well as more domain name content accessible only by clicking on the post title hyperlink.

Today marks the one year anniversary of the LLLL.com buyout and a fitting day to start blogging at www.LLLL.com.

Despite criticism regarding the performance of short domains lately, many short domain investors have defied the skeptics and realized enormous sales this year. LLL.coms saw CPC.com and MCC.com realize $210,750 and $195,000 respectively and LLLL.coms saw a flurry of sales among dictionary words reach as high as $9,999,950 for Fund.com. Unet.com led the year for VCVC-type LLLL.coms, bringing in $100,000, Atty.com brought in $48,900 and Kudo.com brought in $40,000. The real winner this year in the LLLL.com space were pronounceables, especially CVCVs which saw enormous returns and weathered the economic storm better than most domaining segments.

The short numeric domain market has been the big winner this year and continues to record solid numbers. NNN.coms reported numerous massive enduser sales this year, led by 173.com and 770.com which sold for $302,790 and $343,000 respectively. Not far behind, 11.com and 880.com saw $188,888 each and 6 other NNN.coms reported sales for over $100,000 as documented by DN Journal. NNNN.coms continue to post solid sales month after month on Sedo and have also seen some enormous sales recently — 8808.com selling for $51,111 and 8008.com selling for $58,889. Most domainers haven’t unfortunately been as successful as Marchex finding top dollar endusers for NNNN.coms, however NNNN.coms in general continue to record solid sales in the $400-$1000 range. After quickly rising in value and popularity from January through June 2008, NNNNN.com investors suddenly found themselves in a market which had more sellers than buyers.

The mobile internet is slowly coming along, global internet penetration continues to grow, and demand for short domains remains high, both among domainers and endusers alike. The past year has been full of highs and lows for most short domain name investors, part of the blame being on current economic conditions and part of the blame being overspeculation in some short domain name market segments.

This blog will be dedicated to short domains of 5 or less characters. If you’re new to domaining and stumbled across this blog, I highly recommend visiting the Namepros Short Domain Discussion forum. It’s full of information on not just LLLL.coms but short domains in general.

Phil, the previous owner of LLLL.com (who goes by the handle “VURG” on Namepros and DN Forum) started sharing information about the LLLL.com market back in early 2006 on Namepros. Thanks to his research and the work of DYYO.com, early LLLL.com investors were able to make more informed decisions about how to go about investing in LLLL.coms.

Research provided by Phil in the Namepros LLLL.com Countdown Thread follows. If you have the time, give the thread a read and relive LLLL.com history as those invested in them back in the day saw it.

22% Remaining - 25th January 2006
19% Remaining - 31st March 2006
16% Remaining - 29th June 2006
13% Remaining - 1st August 2006
10% Remaining - 15th February 2007 (crossed without traffic testing early April)
9% Remaining - 26th February 2007 (crossed without traffic testing early May)
8% Remaining - 2nd March 2007 (crossed without traffic testing in June)
7% Remaining - 21st March 2007 (crossed without traffic testing early July)
6% Remaining - 3rd July 2007(crossed without traffic testing some time in July)
5% Remaining - 1st August 2007(crossed without traffic testing August 11)
4% Remaining - 14th August 2007(crossed late August)
3% Remaining - 15th September 2007(crossed In September)
2% Remaining - 14th October 2007
1% Remaining - 31st October 2007
0% Remaining - 2nd November - COUNTDOWN COMPLETE!

Thanks for visiting www.LLLL.com and I hope you’ll be back soon! If there’s anything related to short domains you’d like more information on, please feel free to leave a comment or send an email to reece(at)LLLL.com and I’ll do my best to cover it in a future blog post. I’ll be adding a short domain name price guide later this month which should help better track the performance of short domains across domain extensions.

Want to learn more about short domain names? Do you know the difference between short domain name terms such as LLL.com and NNNN.com? This short domain name guide will explain in detail what all of the most common short domain terms mean. There are many different types of short domains and even if you’re an experienced domain name investor, you will most likely find this short domain name guide useful. Successfully investing in short domains requires a thorough understanding of the various short domain name markets and the prices short domain go for in those short domain name markets. Covered in this short domain name guide are everything from 2 letter .coms to 5 letter .coms, with numbers and combinations of numbers and letters (referred in the domain name business as “characters”) also being covered. The next time someone asked you how many premium letters your short domain has, you’ll have no problem telling them! This short domain name guide is encyclopedic in content and should serve as a great reference — both now and in the future.

C = Character. When seen in a domain name listing, the number of C’s refers to the number of characters in a domain name. In the domain name industry, the term Character refers to either a Letter of the English alphabet (A-Z) or a Number (0-9). A domain with many characters may have both many letters and many numbers. When used in conjunction with “V”, C takes on the meaning of Consonant.

L = Letter. When seen is a domain name listing, the number of L’s refers to the number of letters in a domain name. Letters are sometimes represented as C or V, when referring to a particular Consonant-Vowel letter pattern domain name.

N = Number. When seen in a domain name listing, the number of N’s refers to the number of numbers in a domain name.

Premium = A premium domain name (when speaking of short domains) is a domain name composed exclusively of letters: A,B,C,D,E,F,G,H,I,L,M,N,O,P,R,S,T. These letters are referred to as “premium letters”. A premium domain is, in other words, a domain devoid of: J,K,Q,U,V,W,X,Y,Z. These letters are commonly referred to as non-premium letters. The letters J,K,U,V,W,Y are considered by most domain investors to be of higher quality than the letters Q,X,Z. The letters J,K,U,V,W,Y are commonly referred to as “semi-premium” letters, whereas Q,X,Z are referred to as “bad letters”. These terms are used strictly in a reseller setting and currently hold the largest weight in the 3 and 4 letter markets. More information on premium letters and premium domains, along with many examples will be provided in the 4 letter (LLLL) .com section which is included midway through this guide.

As a general rule, Characters can be represented by Letters or Numbers. A 3 letter .com (LLL.com) is in other words, a type of 3 Character .com (CCC.com). Likewise, a 3 number .com (NNN.com) is also considered a 3 Character .com. Because all number and all letter domains, such as LLL.coms and NNN.coms sell for considerably more than other 3 character domains, domainers typically refer to them as LLL.coms and NNN.coms, and not CCC.coms (3 Character .coms), despite them being composed of 3 characters. The following are industry terms and an explanation of their meaning.

LL.com = 2 Letter .com. Two Letters from A-Z. They may be the same letter or different letters. Examples include: AA.com, BC.com, DJ.com, MX.com, YQ.com.

LN.com = Letter-Number .com. One Letter from A-Z followed by One Number from 0-9. Examples include: A1.com, B9.com, X2.com, Y5.com.

NL.com = Number-Letter .com. One Number from 0-9 followed by One Letter from A-Z. Examples include: 1A.com, 9B.com, 2X.com, 5Y.com. Notice the difference in letter-number placement between an LN.com and an NL.com.

NN.com = 2 Number .com. Two Numbers from 0-9. They may be the same or different numbers. Examples include 11.com, 21.com, 47.com, 90.com.

LLL.com = 3 Letter .com. Contains 3 Letters from A-Z. Examples include: AAB.com, ABC.com, JHD.com, OOO.com.

LLN.com = Letter-Letter-Number .com. Two Letters from A-Z followed by One Number from 0-9. Examples include: JH7.com, KL4.com, MM8.com, ZX2.com.

LNL.com = Letter-Number-Letter .com. One Letter from A-Z followed by One Number from 0-9, which is followed by One Letter from A-Z. Examples include: B2B.com, G4S.com, B3G.com, Y2K.com.

LNN.com = Letter-Number-Number .com. One Letter from A-Z followed by Two Numbers from 0-9. Examples include: C93.com, D22.com, B16.com, W40.com.

NLL.com = Number-Letter-Letter .com. One Number from 0-9 followed by Two Letters from A-Z. Examples include: 4DD.com, 3NT.com, 7WJ.com, 9QS.com.

NLN.com = Number-Letter-Number .com. One Number from 0-9 followed by One Letter from A-Z, which is followed by One Number from 0-9. Examples include: 2D4.com, 5Y7.com, 6R1.com, 3F2.com.

NNL.com = Number-Number-Letter .com. Two Numbers from 0-9 followed by One Letter from A-Z. Examples include: 40A.com 66V.com, 75J.com, 91R.com.

NNN.com = 3 Number .com. Contains 3 Numbers from 0-9. Examples include: 123.com, 300.com, 444.com, 747.com.

LLLL.com = 4 Letter .com. Contains 4 Letters from A-Z. Below we define different types of 4 Letter .coms.

Anti-Premium: A domain name that contains only non-premium letters. An anti-premium domain is
a domain which is composed strictly of letters: J,K,Q,U,V,W,X,Y,Z. The term Anti-Premium is most commonly applied to 4 Letter .coms, however it also makes a good adjective to describe  LLL.coms selling near the minimum wholesale as well. Examples of Anti-Premium LLL.coms include: YXZ.com, VKQ.com, XZW.com, QKU.com. Examples of Anti-Premium LLLL.coms include: WKQU.com, XYQZ.com, YQUW.com, KQJV.com. Anti-Premium LLLL.coms are the lowest quality LLLL.coms on the market and are generally among the cheapest.

Single Premium: We use this term to refer LLLL.coms containing only one premium letter. Examples of Single Premium LLLL.coms include: JHXZ.com, UQTX.com, WQUE.com, EUWJ.com.

Double Premium: We use this term to refer to LLLL.coms containing two premium letters. Examples of Double Premium LLLL.coms include: ASWQ.com, BJKT.com, WVMG.com, HWRZ.com.

Triple Premium: We use this term to refer to LLLL.coms containing three premium letters. Examples of Triple Premium LLLL.coms include: ASDX.com, POSW.com, NWOO.com, XEEB.com.
LLL.coms containing three premium letters are commonly referred to as “Premium LLL.coms”. Examples include: SAS.com, RTN.com, NPG.com, RSS.com.

Quad Premium: We use this term to refer to LLLL.coms containing four premium letters. Examples of Quad Premium LLLL.coms include: AAAL.com, FFLE.com, MNGO.com, GHPR.com.

We’re not going to be particularly strict on the letter Y as to its consonant and/or vowel status in this guide… There is little consensus on where the letter Y should fall. My personal belief is that it should be classified as a vowel when it takes the role of a vowel (examples: RUBY, HOLY), and classified as a consonant when it does not (examples: YAMS, YOLK).

CVCV = A 4 letter .com domain name which follows a Consonant-Vowel-Consonant-Vowel letter pattern. CVCVs are generally extremely pronounceable and are among the most valuable LLLL.coms. Examples include: MELO.com, MOFO.com, ZENE.com, LUMI.com. Many CVCVs are actual words in English or in another language and that partly contributes to their high valuations, on top of their immense brandability and obvious enduser potential.

CVVC = A 4 letter .com domain name which follows a Consonant-Vowel-Vowel-Consonant letter pattern. Examples include: NOOL.com, ROOX.com, BEER.com, MOOT.com.

VCCV = A 4 letter .com domain name which follows a Vowel-Consonant-Consonant-Vowel letter pattern. Examples include: ADDA.com, ELLO.com, INGE.com, UGFO.com

VCVC = A 4 letter .com domain name which follows a Vowel-Consonant-Vowel-Consonant letter pattern. VCVCs are often among the most pronounceable and desirable LLLL.coms, right up there with CVCVs. Examples include: OPAL.com, ONEX.com, ILEC.com, UQEN.com.

AABB = A 4 letter .com domain name which contains only 2 different letters, where “A” and “B” symbolically represent two different letters from A-Z. Examples include: CCDD.com, DDJJ.com, MMXX.com, ZZGG.com.

ABAB = A 4 letter .com domain name which contains only 2 different letters, where “A” and “B” symbolically represent two different letters from A-Z. Examples include: CDCD.com, DJDJ.com, MXMX.com, ZGZG.com.

Palindromes = A 4 letter .com domain name which contains only 2 different letters from A-Z. Examples include: CDDC.com, DJJD.com, MXXM.com, ZGGZ.com. Palindromes are commonly referred to ABBA-type LLLL.coms. They inherited the name Palindrome due to their identical nature when reading from left to right or right to left.

Triple Letter = An LLLL.com containing three of the same letter. These are sometimes referred to as Triple letter repeats in the case it is of an AAAB or BAAA letter pattern. Examples include: SSSJ.com, SWWW.com, HHGH.com, IJII.com. Notice how each of these examples showcases the Triple Letter LLLL.com differently. These are all considered Triple Letter LLLL.coms.

VVVV = A 4 letter .com domain name which contains four vowels. Examples include: AEIO.com, EUOU.com, IOUI.com, EAUU.com.

CVCCV = A 5 letter .com domain name which follows a Consonant-Vowel-Consonant-Consonant-Vowel letter pattern. CVCCVs are among the most popular 5L.com domain names which are registered and resold today.
Examples include: RORRE.com, FOGGE.com, ZINNE.com, VISTA.com.

CVCVC = A 5 letter .com domain name which follows a Consonant-Vowel-Consonant-Vowel-Consonant letter pattern. CVCVCs are essentially CVCVs with an additional consonant at the end.
Examples include: FALES.com, FIRAL.com, SAGEP.com, LINUX.com.

CVCVV = A 5 letter .com domain name which follows a Consonant-Vowel-Consonant-Vowel-Vowel letter pattern. CVCVVs are essentially CVCVs with an additional vowel at the end.
Examples include: RAGOO.com, PARIA.com, MELOO.com, MONEE.com.

CVVCV = A 5 letter .com domain name which follows a Consonant-Vowel-Vowel-Consonant-Vowel letter pattern. CVVCVs are CVCVs with an additional vowel included before the second consonant.
Examples: ZOOME.com, ROOMI.com, PIECO.com, MOOLA.com.

VCVCV = A 5 letter .com domain name which follows a Vowel-Consonant-Vowel-Consonant-Vowel letter pattern. VCVCVs are essential VCVCs with an additional vowel at the end.
Examples include: ATOMO.com, EFOTO.com, ISAMI.com, OSIRA.com.

Due to the high prices CVCVs and VCVCs have been seeing lately, many 5L.com investors see CVCCV, CVCVC, CVCVV, CVVCV, and VCVCV as five of the most promising 5L.com alternatives to brandable LLLL.coms which are rapidly increasing in price.